ICONOGRAPHY

Our most recent collection of icons are reflections and variations on traditional Icon Paintings. Women iconographers around the world are making and designing beautiful New Byzantine style icons. Ironically, women may be the ones who preserve this great Orthodox tradition. Many christian women await a resounding new voice lost to them through the early church.

The practice of painting icons and the medium egg tempera manifests an unavoidable self-transformation over time. Once we understand this, everything that takes place between ourselves and the activity of painting appears in a new light through layers of paint and metaphor. Many internal obstacles get loosened through the practice of painting icons in Egg tempera. Of late, some of those loose areas have been the way catholic women have been portrayed or the absence of their portrayal throughout tradition. It has been a long journey to learn and explore this largely male icon tradition from a women's perspective.

The infinite range of imagination found in Divine image has merged with my interpretation of the present. Female icon painters are women who teach, and/or the unheard voices of women mystics. I hope all of the work reflects humankind's continual joy found in spiritual pursuit. Iconographers attempt to paint what we cannot see, our theological and spiritual insights. What often inspires me is the million year old dirt; ancient stone pigments I paint with. The earth was divinely created, and governs a wide array of color and diverse textures used in icon painting. All of life has come from the unseen energy of God, only to be seen in color and formed in creation.

Mary Jane Miller

Mary Jane Miller has painted icons for more than twenty five years. Her hope as a women iconographer is to create images where people might come closer to God. Painting modern catholic icons, and designing New Byzantine style image, Mary Jane Miller pushes the edge of tradition with respect and grace through beautiful icon images.